Madrid. The death of the American writer Paul Auster caused enormous sadness in the cultural sphere of Spain, where the novelist was read and followed with devotion. From the publishers that published it in Cervantes’ language, Grupo Planeta and Seix Barral, expressed their deep regret for the death of our author and friend Paul Auster (1947-2024). We join in the pain of his wife Siri and Sophie, Spencer and Miles, and that of his countless readers
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The universal figure of Auster also provoked reactions from the world of politics, among them that of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, the socialist José Manuel Albares, who expressed his weigh
by a big loss. He leaves us his extraordinary novels, with which we will continue to see the world from Brooklyn and read about lives that lead us to other lives.
. In addition to the second vice president of the government and leader of the left-wing Sumar coalition, Yolanda Díaz, who warned that Paul Auster has died and the mind does not have time to find a word of comfort, as he himself wrote. He leaves us an immense, popular and meta-literary, incisive and intelligent work. My condolences to Siri Hustvedt, extraordinary writer and your life partner
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The poet and novelist Manuel Vilas also added to the feeling of mourning, pointing out that Paul Auster, one of the great American writers, has died. When a writer dies, our love of life dies
. The writer Miguel Ángel Hernández also warned that “The invention of loneliness It is one of the books that I have read the most times. The book of illusions, one of the ones I have enjoyed the most. I owe Paul Auster much more happiness and wisdom than I do to close people in my life. That’s why today is a very sad day here. Rest in peace”.
The writer and critic Sergi Vila-Sanjuán pointed out that “with Paul Auster one of the greatest writers of our time leaves. I heard about him for the first time in Madrid, in 1986. I was staying in the apartment of a friend, Ramón from Spain, who told me about him. City of glass (The glass city), a novel that had fascinated him. It hypnotized me too. “My friend convinced the people in charge of Júcar, a small publishing house at the time, to publish it, and he translated it into Spanish.”
Elena Ramírez, Paul Auster’s Spanish editor, wrote in the newspaper The vanguard an article as a farewell, in which he recalls: I met Paul Auster many years ago, when I approached him at the end of an event to ask if he could introduce me to his wife, the writer Siri Hustvedt. Accustomed to his prominence overshadowing her talent, Paul always remembered my daring with complicity and affection. If there is something that has defined Paul on a personal level, it has been his passionate demand for the equal treatment that his wife’s talent deserved when she was still seen as Paul Auster’s wife, and the deep love that was reflected in her eyes and smile when He talked about Siri, or his daughter Sophie and his newborn grandson, Miles, a small but atomic family nucleus, a refuge for a person marked by a traumatic family past, who never took his little bubble of domestic happiness for granted.
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The editor also warned that “the determination, yes, that is the word, with which he has written each of the books that are part of his literary legacy, is only comparable to the incredible beauty of the novel that puts the finishing touch.” to that legacy, Baumgartner. Paul began to take refuge in his writing from the pain of the tragic loss of his son and granddaughter, and the novel shows how we must move on when we have lost the one we love most and reflects great tenderness, luminosity and love for life. , even when it doesn’t go the way we wanted.”